Sometimes you have to lose your balance in order to find it.

The Good Life

I think I should have been born a European, I’m not very particular about the country. I spent some time there in college, and absolutely fell in love with it. The lifestyle, the culture, the art, the fashion the FOOD (and drink). While I love the fact that I can travel all over Central America via bus, it doesn’t compare to being able to take a night train to Paris or Switzerland. There are many other places I still want to travel to, and I am DEFINITELY looking forward to moving back State side this winter, but if I ever get the opportunity to move to Europe for awhile, I’m jumping on it! (Being able to make some Euros while doing this would bonus).

Since I can’t live there right now, or even visit, I’m settling with reading about it. I just finished the novel ‘The Paris Wife’ by Paula Mclain. It is a bit depressing, but you expect that going into the novel, I mean you know things didn’t end well for Ernest Hemingway despite his fame and fortune.

Aside from the relationship falling apart, and the almost annoying main character, the book is absolutely beautiful. It makes you want to cry in parts, but it also makes you want to drink champagne and martinis under the olive, fig and lemon trees by the ocean on the French Riveria, Ski in Switzerland and apres ski even harder in front of the fireplace in your beautiful mountainside Chalet, and sit in the sunshine at an outside cafe in Pampalona while observing the running of the bulls. Oh, and since it’s the 1920s you get to do all this with the likes of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ezra Pound.

Now that this book is done I’m started on The Count of Monte Cristo. Not only does it take place in Europe (although a century apart from the former novel) it is also one of the books on my summer reading list. I’ve mentioned on the blog before that I have some reading goals during my time here, and while I have read a bunch, there is still a lot to go.

Some other good European treasures I’ve read recently and recommend: Julia Child’s ‘My Life in France’, ‘The Elegance of the Hedgehog’ by Muriel Barber, ‘Tender is the Night’ F. Scott Fitzgerald

Don’t get me wrong, I love Latin America: the heat, the dancing, the adventure, the beaches, the sloths and volcanos, but to be honest, I’m going to need some more museums, wine and cheese in my life.